Patchwork wrote:I've been thinking about picking up Elfball. How long does a game of Elfball run on average?
Once you get the feel for the game and if you use the 3 optional rules I mentioned above ... about an hour to 75 minutes.
Since you play until someone scores ... if you are looking for a timed game your best bet is the Elfball card deck (which we are temporarily out of stock of ... getting more printed). At the beginning of each turn you take a card, some have bonuses and some do nothing. Once the card deck is done ... the game is done (so you can either play to first score or agree to play until the deck runs out). The person with the most do nothing cards in case of a tie wins.
Easy way to do this with a 52 card deck is this:
Number cards = Nothing happens
All 4 Jacks = +1 Jog to a player of your choice this turn
All 4 Queens = +1 Skill to a player of your choice this turn
All 4 Kings = +1 Tackle to a player of your choice this turn
All 4 Aces = +3 Momentum to your team for this turn
If you have Jokers (54 card deck) and want to use them than have the 2 Jokers = +1 to any one player attritube for this turn
This is not the same as the Elfball card deck as it has a lot of other fun things in it for effects ... but it will serve in a pinch very easily.
So for your first game ... I'd use a deck of cards like mentioned above ... and the other optional rules as well ... the game should run pretty quickly despite needing to learn the number of successes to do things. As you get used to the rules you can decide which if any of the optional rules you want to no longer use ... but the optional rules are there to make sure your first game doesn't take 3 hours to play as you get used to it.
Galak